Chapter 85 Cat Town (6)

In three or four months, I learned the cat language.Malay can be learned within half a year, and cat language is much simpler.Four or five hundred words can be said upside down and everything can be said.Naturally, many things and truths cannot be explained clearly in this way. The cat people have a way: don't talk about it.Adjectives and adverbs are few, and nouns are not rich.Everything that looks like a lost tree is a lost tree: a big lost tree, a small lost tree, a round lost tree, a pointed lost tree, a foreign lost tree, a large lost lost tree... In fact, these trees are by no means the same.The leaves of the lost tree are the treasures that intoxicate.Pronouns are not used much, there are no relational pronouns at all.A very childish language.In fact, just memorizing some nouns is enough for conversation, and most of the verbs can be assisted by gestures.They also have characters, some small buildings and towers, which are very difficult to recognize; ordinary cat people can only remember a dozen or so at most.

Daxie—that's the name of my feline friend—knows many words and can compose poetry.Pile up some good-sounding nouns together, without any simple thought, you can form a cat poem.Baby leaf, baby flower, baby mountain, baby cat, baby belly... This is Daxie's "feelings from reading history".Cat people have a history, a civilization of more than 20,000 years.I can speak, and I understand everything.Scorpion is an important figure in the cat country, a big landlord, politician, poet and military officer.The big landlord, because he has a large fan tree, and the fan leaves are the food of the cat people's food.Why he raised me has a lot to do with this lost leaf.According to him, he took out several pieces of history to testify—the books are all made of stone, one piece is two feet square and half an inch thick, and each piece has a dozen or so extremely complicated characters—five hundred years ago, they were Planting the land and harvesting grain, I don't know what a lost leaf is.Suddenly a foreigner brought it to the cat country.At first, only the upper class could afford it, but later they brought the maze tree, and everyone became addicted to it.In less than fifty years, people who do not eat it are exceptions.How comfortable and trouble-free it is to eat lost leaves; but there is one thing, although after eating, although the energy is refreshed, the hands and feet do not like to move, so the farmers stopped planting, the workers stopped working, and everyone became idle.The government issued an order: no more eating fan leaves.At noon on the first day of the order, the empress was so addicted that she slapped the emperor three times in the mouth—the big scorpion moved a piece of history—and the emperor was so addicted to tears.In the afternoon, another order was issued: Mi Ye was designated as "national food".In the history of cats, there is nothing more honorable or merciful than this incident, Daxie said.

In the more than four hundred years since the fan leaf was designated as the national food, the development of the civilization of the cat country has accelerated several times compared to before.If you don't like physical labor after eating the leaves, you can naturally do more spiritual work.Poetry, for example, has improved much more than before; none of the poets in the past 20,000 years has used "baby belly". However, this does not mean that there will be no political and social disputes.Three hundred years ago, the planting of lost trees was common.But the more people eat, the lazier they become, and gradually they don't even bother to plant trees.It also happened to be a year of floods—the gray face of the big scorpion seemed a little pale, it turns out that cat people are most afraid of water—and washed away a lot of woods.If there is nothing else to eat, the cat people can bear it; if there is no lost leaves, they can't be lazy anymore.There was robbery everywhere.There were too many robberies, so the government issued the most humane order: those who rob fans and eat leaves are not guilty.These three hundred years have been the era of robbery; it is not a bad thing, robbery is the best way to express personal freedom, and freedom is the highest ideal of cat people ever since.

(Note: The "freedom" in cat language is not the same as in Chinese. The so-called free people of cat people are bullying others, not cooperating, making trouble... This is why men and women do not get close. A free man is No one is allowed to touch him, no handshakes or kisses when meeting each other, but a twist of the head back to show respect.) "So, why do you still plant trees?" I asked in cat language—according to the form of real cat language, this sentence should be: twist your neck (meaning "then"), point to (you), Roll your eyes twice (why), plant (verb) a tree? The word "yet" cannot be expressed.

The big scorpion closed its mouth for a while.The catman's mouth is always open, and the nose doesn't care much about breathing, and it closes occasionally to express pride or deep thought.His answer was: there are only dozens of people planting trees now, and they are all powerful people—politicians, officers, poets and landlords.They had to plant trees, otherwise they would lose all their influence.Doing politics requires fans, otherwise you will not see the emperor.To be an officer requires a maze tree, which is military pay.Poetry must be lost, it can make people dream during the day.In short, the lost leaf is omnipotent, with it, one can run amok for a lifetime. "Rampage" is the noblest word in the mouth of a classy cat.

Trying to protect Milin is the first job of Scorpion and other landowners.Although they have soldiers, they cannot do anything for them.Cat soldiers talk about freedom, as long as they eat lost leaves, they don't know how to obey orders.Their own soldiers often come to rob them, which is the most logical thing in Catman's mind - as can be seen from the big scorpion's tone.Who will protect Milin?foreigners.Each landowner must keep several foreigners as protectors.Cat people's awe of foreigners is a feature in their nature.Their freedom cannot allow five soldiers to live together for three days without killing anyone, and it is impossible to fight outsiders.Da Xie added, very proudly, "The ability to kill each other is getting stronger day by day, and the method of killing is almost as ingenious as writing poetry."

"Killing has become an art," I said.There is no "art" in cat language. After I explained it for a long time, he still couldn't understand, but he remembered these two Chinese characters. In ancient times they also fought wars with foreign countries, and they were victorious. However, in the past five hundred years, the result of cannibalism made them completely forget the concept of fighting against foreigners, and they all fought internally.Therefore, they are very afraid of foreigners; without the auspices of foreigners, their emperor can't even eat fans. AA visited a plane three years ago.Where it came from, the cat people don't know, but they remember that there is a big hairless bird in the world.

When my plane arrived, the cat people knew it was a foreigner.They can only think that I am from Mars, but they cannot think of other planets besides Mars. Daxie and a group of landlords all ran to the plane, in order to get a foreigner to protect Milin.Their original foreign protectors had all returned home for unknown reasons, so new ones had to be hired. They agreed: After you invite me, everyone will take turns to take care of me, because foreigners are very difficult to invite recently. "Please" me is their intention, who knows that I don't have a cat face, they have never seen a foreigner like me.They were terribly frightened; but seeing how honest I was, they decided to change from "please" to "catch".They are "characters" of the cat country, so they have a lot of eyes, and they will take some risks when necessary.Now that I think about it, if I had used force at the beginning, I could have scared them away; but fortunately I didn't use force, because they would never give up if I scared them away for a while, and besides, I couldn't find food at all.On the other hand, being caught by them like this, even if they are still afraid of me, they won't "respect" me.Sure enough, from asking me to be monopolized by the public, Daxie and the group of landlords all saw the advantage: If you catch me, you don't need to negotiate any conditions with me, as long as you provide me with food, so everyone changed. Heart.Breaking a contract and breaking an oath is a part of freedom, and Daxie feels that his success is very proud.

Tie me up and put me in the boat, and they all went around the path to wait for me at the hut with the roof of the sky.They are afraid of water and dare not get on the boat.If the boat capsizes halfway, it can only be blamed on my misfortune, and it has nothing to do with them.The hut was not far from a stretch of sand, and the river was almost dry at the sand, and the boat would definitely stop. Put me in the hut, and they went home to eat the lost leaves.They can't have this treasure by their side; it's most dangerous to walk with a baffle; therefore they walk seldom; this adventure is a special sacrifice.

The scorpion's forest is the closest to the hut; but it still takes a long time before I think of seeing me.After eating the fan leaves, you have to sleep for a while.He must have known that no one else would come soon.He arrived, and others arrived, which was completely unexpected to him. "Blessed is the art," he pointed to my pistol, as if grateful for it.Later, he called all indescribable things "art". I understood everything, and it was time to ask him: What was that fetter made of?He shook his head and only told me that it was something from a foreign country. "There are a lot of foreign things," he said, "very useful, but we don't bother to imitate; we are the oldest country among all countries!" He closed his mouth for a while: "It is very difficult to wear bracelets and fetters when you walk. Useful!" This may be the truth, or it may be joking about me.I asked him where he lived every night, because there was only my little cave in the woods, and he must have somewhere else to sleep.He seemed unwilling to answer, and asked me for a piece of art, which was to be shown to the emperor.I gave him a match, and didn't ask him where he slept; in this kind of free society, everyone has to keep some secrets.

Do you have any family members?He nodded. "Collect the lost leaves and go home, you go with me." He still has a place to use me, I think, but: "Where is my home?" "The capital, where the great emperor lives. There are many foreigners, you can see your friends now." "I came from the earth, and I don't know people on Mars." "Anyway, you are a foreigner, and foreigners and foreigners are friends." There is no need to explain to him; I just hope that the lost leaves will be collected soon, so that I can go to Cat City to have a look.